“Must be tough to conduct business negotiations,” he drawled.
“Not particularly,” she snapped, her chin coming up. “I conduct negotiations fairly and honestly.”
The icy reply knifed through the air like a blade. Blackstone dipped his head in acknowledgment of the hit and hooked his thumbs in the pockets of his wrinkled khakis. The movement swung open the flaps of his jungle print shirt and gave Nina an unobstructed view of black cotton stretched across a muscled chest, but she was too miffed to appreciate the view.
“About those negotiations,” he said, with a considering look. “Didn’t you tell me earlier that your company supplies medical trend data to a host of private and governmental research centers?”
“Yes. So?”
“So I’m guessing government contracts must account for a sizable chunk of your business.”
Nina drew in a swift breath. Government contracts accounted for more than a chunk. They constituted almost half of her business base.
“You’d better not be thinking what I think you’re thinking, Blackstone!”
“If you’re thinking those contracts can be cancelled with one phone call, I guess I am.”
He didn’t so much as blink. The bald-faced effrontery of it, the sheer gall, made Nina gasp.
“I don’t believe this! You’re actually trying to blackmail me into helping you?”
“Not trying, Dr. Grant.”
He was dead serious. She could see it in his eyes, in the set of his jaw. She open her mouth to tell him go straight to hell. Then she remembered how many people she had on her payroll and snapped it shut again.
She’d worked so hard to build her business. Everyone at Grant Medical Systems had. Without their government contracts, she would have to cut back. Lay off a dozen or more employees. Grinding her teeth, she yielded.
“All right. I’ll scout out Cordell’s compound for you. Just so you know, though, he and my sleaze of an ex-fiancé aren’t the only bastards I’ve encountered lately.”
Wolf hid a wince. Exploiting snitches and useful contacts were part of his business. He’d never hesitated to strong-arm anyone into cooperating before. He wouldn’t hesitate in the future. That didn’t lessen the bite from the scorn in Nina Grant’s brown eyes—or explain why it bothered him so much.
“I need to contact my people and have them send the equipment.”
She waved a hand toward the phone on the counter and treated him to a caustic smile. “Be my guest.”
“I’ll use my own.”
He slid back the balcony doors and went outside. The triangular hot tub tucked into a corner of the deck drew a wry smile. Not a good spot for the acrophobic, suspended over the sea the way it was. But the bubbling water and the waves pounding against the rocky shore below provided an excellent sound buffer for a private conversation.
As he had at the Purple Parrot, Wolf angled the instrument so its built-in iris scanner instantly identified him. One click of a key connected him to OMEGA control. Ace’s unshaven face filled the screen.
“What’s happening, pardner?”
“A new development.” His glance cut to the woman standing rigid with anger in the center of the living room. “Dr. Grant’s having lunch at Cordell’s hacienda tomorrow.”
“Damn! We scrubbed her, Wolf. Up one side and down the other. We couldn’t find a connection.”
“She swears there isn’t one, other than the chance meeting this afternoon.”
“So what’s with lunch?”
“I suspect Cordell researched her, too. As we both know, the man has a taste for wealthy, attractive women.”
His glance raked Nina Grant from head to foot. Attractive didn’t really describe the doc. She wasn’t what Hollywood types would label a classic beauty. Her chin was too stubborn and her mouth lacked the collagen pout that seemed to be the standard these day. Especially now, when she’d folded her lips into a tight, angry line and her eyes shot daggers at the man who’d invaded her luxury casita.
She had one hell of a body, though. Long and well toned and curved in all the right places. When he’d followed her along the pathway to the marina, Wolf had caught more than enough of her silhouette backlighted through her linen dress to know he’d give her his vote anytime, any place.
Ace’s low whistle jerked his attention away from Nina Grant and back to the business at hand. “You think Cordell is planning to hit on her, the way he did DeWitt?”
“I think it’s a distinct possibility.”
“Does she know that?”
“No, but I’ll make sure she does before she joins him for lunch tomorrow.”
Ace lifted a brow. “She’s cooperating with us?”
“She is, although she’s not real happy about it.” Guilt bit at Wolf again as he explained about the government contracts. “I want her rigged out before she goes in, Ace. Tell Mac we need the best she’s got in her bag of tricks.”
“Will do.”
Mackenzie Blair had served as guru of all things electronic for OMEGA and several other highly specialized government agencies until the birth of her twins. She was now on an extended leave of absence but still provided her expertise to OMEGA on request. Not surprising, since she was married to Nick Jensen.
“I’ll take care of it,” Ace promised. “You should have a delivery within the next couple hours.”
“Have them deliver it to the Mayan Princess. Dr. Grant’s casita.”
“Roger that. And I’ll update Lightning when I contact Mac.”
“Thanks.”
Flipping the phone shut, Rafe went back inside.
“Okay,” he told the woman standing with her back stiff and her arms crossed, regarding him with all the warmth she would one of Mexico’s spiny iguanas. “I’ve got some equipment on the way. It should be here in a few hours.”
“What kind of equipment?”
“A special camera. It will be so small you won’t even know you’re wearing it. You can…”
“Good God!” Her arms dropped. “You were really serious? You want to rig me out with spy gadgets?”
“We’ll rig you out with more than a gadget. The woman responsible for our electronic surveillance devices is the best in the business.”
And diabolically clever. Mackenzie Blair had sent agents into the field equipped with everything from invisible skin patches with embedded satellite communication capability, to a translucent jade pendant that emitted silent and completely disabling ultrahigh-frequency sound waves.
“Count on whatever device she sends being completely invisible to the untrained eye,” Wolf assured his extremely reluctant recruit.
“Untrained being the operative word.”
Grant shook her head stubbornly, her soft brown hair swirling around her face.
“Cordell’s goons, as you call them, almost did a strip search before they let me through the gate this afternoon. What if they do the same tomorrow?”
“Trust me, they won’t detect whatever we equip you with.”
“Trust you?” Scorn dripped from every word. “You expect me to trust a man who scares me half to death, then blackmails me into cooperating with him?”
Wolf bit back a sigh. He could tell it was going to be a long night.
“Sit down, Dr. Grant. I’ll talk you through exactly what I want you to do, step by step.”
As promised, Ace briefed Lightning when he contacted him and Mac at home that evening. He briefed the boss again at 11:00 a.m. DC time the next morning, following a terse update from Wolf.
After checking the status board to confirm Lightning was in his office, Ace took the titanium-shielded elevator that zipped individuals from the control center to the offices of the special envoy on the first floor. Before exiting, he checked the security screen displaying the entire first-floor reception area. Although Lightning’s executive assistant had cleared him to see the boss, Chelsea Jackson was relatively new to OMEGA operations. She’d replaced silver-haired Elizabeth Wells, who’d reti
red a few months ago and waltzed off into the sunset with the orthopedic surgeon who’d done her hip replacement.
Jackson was brisk and efficient, but a number of OMEGA operatives—Ace included—had yet to warm up to her. Maybe because she was so brisk and efficient. In contrast to grandmotherly Elizabeth, Ms. Jackson kept her personal life private and maintained a polite but firm distance from the field agents.
The shield was in place when she greeted Ace. “I informed Lightning you were on your way down,” she said in her cool, Boston brahman voice. “Go right in.”
Ace stifled the impulse to linger beside her Louis XV desk and coax a smile out of the woman. What he had for Lightning was too urgent. He couldn’t resist revving up his Texas twang, however. “Thanks, darlin’.”
She did her best to hide a flicker of annoyance while she pressed the hidden button that gave him access to Lightning’s private office. Ace caught it though, and allowed himself a brief grin before he entered the inner sanctum.
As befitted the President’s Special Envoy, the office contained enough polished mahogany to panel a medium-size castle. Bypassing the conference table that took up a good portion of the room, Ace took one of the high-backed chairs set in front of Lightning’s desk.
“I just briefed the president an hour ago on our plan to infiltrate Cordell’s compound,” OMEGA's tawny-haired director said. “I hope you’re not going to tell me there’s been a change of direction.”
“Sorry, Chief. There has.”
Sighing, Nick loosened the knot of his red silk tie. He’d held this job long enough to know nothing ever went down as originally orchestrated. Given the stakes in this op, however, he’d hoped for the best.
“What’s the glitch?”
“Dr. Grant.”
“She’s changed her mind about cooperating?” he asked, sharply.
“She hasn’t changed her mind. Wolf has. He says Grant doesn’t have the makings of an undercover operative. The mere prospect of going in wired gets her all nervous and flustered. If we send her in alone, he’s convinced she’ll tip Cordell we’re on to him.”
“Damn it!” Blowing out a frustrated breath, Lightning thrust a hand through his sun-streaked hair. “She was our best bet for getting inside the compound.”
“She still is, but Wolf is going with her.”
“How?”
“Turns out Grant recently dumped her fiancé.” A wry grin creased Ace’s bristly, unshaven cheeks. “Wolf intends to step into his shoes.”
Chapter 4
“You’re crazy! All of you!”
Completely wrung out by her long, frustrating night, Nina glared at the three men facing her across the coffee table. Cups ringed with the dregs of the countless pots of coffee they’d consumed were scattered on the polished slab of marble, as were the remnants of the breakfast her uninvited guests had ordered from room service.
“It’s the only way, Dr. Grant.”
That came from Chief Inspector Manuel Diaz. Sad-eyed and scarecrow thin, Diaz and one of his henchmen had rapped on the door to Nina’s casita well past midnight. They’d brought with them an almost microscopic wireless device hidden inside a pearl button. Flown in by jet at the request of El Lobo, Diaz had advised her.
El Lobo. The Wolf. Otherwise known as Rafe Blackstone. If that was really his name. Nina wouldn’t put it past him to have faked that California driver’s license.
He stood across from her now, hands on hips and his face set with a frustration to match hers. Tough! It wasn’t her fault she couldn’t work the damn camera. She’d told this guy, Wolf, she was a terrible liar. Although he and Mannie Diaz had done their best to coax her out of her jitters, she’d fumbled every attempt to appear nonchalant while scanning the interior of her own casita. So how the heck was she supposed to pull off scanning Cordell’s entire hacienda, much less hide the listening device they wanted her to plant.
She’d finally given up around 4:00 a.m., and announced she was going to take a break while they figured out an alternate solution. They’d waited to drop that solution on her until late midmorning, after she’d finished a late breakfast of bacon and eggs scrambled with salsa, delivered by room service.
“If I can’t carry off a hidden scanner,” she threw at the three men lined up like a firing squad, “how in God’s name do you expect me to carry off a pretend fiancé?”
Sad-eyed Mannie Diaz replied for all three. “This man, this Kevin James, he breaks your heart, yes?”
Actually, a few weeks of time and distance had made Nina realize Kevin the Jerk had hurt her pride more than her heart. She wasn’t about to admit that to these three characters, however. “Now this estúpido appears without warning here in Cabo San Lucas,” Mannie continued. “He tells you he’s sorry. He pleads with you to take him back. Of course you are upset and very confused. But you have accepted Cordell’s invitation to lunch. It would be most impolite to back out now. So you call him, yes? You ask him—no, you tell him you have a guest you wish to bring with you.”
“It won’t work,” she insisted, with a glare in Señor Wolf’s direction. “You don’t know anything about me. Where I went to high school. What kind of music I like.”
“Farmington Regional High School,” he fired back. “Mostly jazz and easy rock, with a hefty dose of show tunes thrown in for flavoring.”
When Nina gaped at him, he gestured to the iPod sitting in the dock in the entertainment center.
“The music part was easy. And you left your tote on the counter,” he said without a trace of apology. “Between that and the information the people at my headquarters dug up on you, I know more than enough to play your very contrite lover.”
“It won’t work,” she repeated, with a touch of desperation. “You may have gleaned a few facts about me, but I know nothing about you.”
“I’ll tell you all you need to know during the drive out to Cordell’s place. At the same time, you can tell me about this guy you were engaged to. Pick up the phone, Nina. Call Cordell. Remember, this lunch is as much in your interest as ours.”
“You,” she got out through clenched teeth, “are really despicable.”
He shrugged aside the insult with the same ease he’d shrugged aside her objections. “Tell Cordell exactly what Mannie said. Your fiancé arrived in Cabo unexpectedly and you’d like to bring him to lunch. Put that way, he can hardly refuse.”
Outgunned and outmaneuvered, Nina marched over to the counter and dialed the number Cordell had given her. To her profound dismay, he responded to her nervous request with urbane charm.
“But of course you must bring your friend. I look forward to meeting him.”
He’d taken the bait, and now she was on the hook! Hanging up the phone, she treated Blackstone to another glare.
“Okay. You’re in.”
“Good.” He checked his watch. “We don’t have much time. You’d better get cleaned up.”
She managed not to slam the bedroom door behind her, but it took some effort. A hot shower and some judicious swipes of eye shadow and lip gloss erased most of the effects of her long night. Her hair presented a real challenge, however. She attacked it with a brush, tried a curling iron and finally decided to just twist up the heavy mass and anchor it with a clip.
What to wear presented another problem. The button-front linen sundress she’d worn yesterday—and most of the night, until she’d finally changed into shorts and a T-shirt—looked like she’d worn it all day and half the night.
She jammed the dress into a laundry bag with a slip requesting same-day service and reached for the multicolored, ankle-length cotton skirt she’d purchased her first day in Cabo. She teamed it with a red silk tank, added a rhinestone-studded belt that rode low on her hips, then slipped her feet into sandals.
“This is insane,” she muttered to the image in the mirror. “Absolutely insane.”
When she came out of the bedroom, Rafe was gripping a leather carryall. “One of Mannie’s men retrieved my gear from my
hotel. Won’t take me long to clean up.”
“We will leave now,” the chief inspector said as Blackstone headed for the bedroom, “so we can be in position when you arrive.”
“Position?” Nina echoed.
“El Lobo and I, we have had Cordell’s hacienda under surveillance for several days. We listen, too, but Cordell is very cautious.”
“You’re not making me feel any better, Chief Inspector Diaz.”
“You don’t need to fear. We will be watching. And you will have El Lobo with you.”
Somehow, that didn’t exactly reassure her.
She was tapping a foot nervously when Wolf reappeared some fifteen minutes later. He’d showered and shaved and combed his damp black hair straight back.
Despite her jumpy nerves, Nina had to admit the man cleaned up extremely well. The wrinkled khakis had given way to pleated black slacks. The jungle print shirt was gone, thank goodness, replaced by a knit polo the same color as the sea at dusk. The deep color intensified the blue of his eyes. Not that they needed intensifying. Nina felt them on every inch of her body as he gave her a final once-over. “Ready?”
“As I’ll ever be.”
“Did you call the desk and ask them to bring up your car?”
“Yes.”
“Good girl. Let’s get this show on the road.”
Hot sun and blinding glare hit them the moment they walked out the door. Wincing, Nina slipped on her sunglasses. Rafe shielded his eyes with tinted aviator glasses. When they took the elevator up from the lower casita level and walked through the pyramid lobby, she saw Ramon was on duty again. “Buenos dias, Dr. Grant.”
“Buenos dias.”
The parking valet gave her a cheerful smile before shifting his glance to Rafe. He was too well trained to comment on the fact that the man Nina had insisted would only be visiting her for a short time had stayed the entire night.
Nor did he question the order of things when Rafe walked around to the driver’s side. With another friendly smile, the valet opened the passenger door for Nina. He already had the air conditioner blasting, so she sank into a welcome bath of chilled air.
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